Gail Brooker could hardly have imagined the commotion it would cause when she packed some puff pastry in her luggage for a trip to France. Mistaking the soft, white substance for Semtex, security staff at Toulouse airport evacuated the area and blew up her luggage. The unfortunate Ms Brooker explained that her partner Peter was rather partial to a chicken puff pastry pie and you just can't get Jus-Rol pastry in France.

We all chuckled at the story but in reality there are very few of us who don't take some little piece of home along when travelling, be it a packet of cornflakes or a photo of the cat. I once caused a minor security incident at Sydney airport when I was stopped for trying to smuggle in some camomile tea bags, and I know an adventurous Aussie backpacker who never travels anywhere without her favourite flannelette pillowcase because it reminds her of home.

But some people always have to go that little bit too far. It's not enough for them to take a little piece of home, they insist on taking their entire home with them when they go on holiday. I used to have a romantic notion that camping was all about leaving the clutter of modern life behind and getting back to basics: just you, a tent, a tin-opener and the great outdoors. So it was with no small degree of disbelief that I awoke on a camping trip last weekend, not to the sound of wood pigeons cooing softly or the wind rustling in the trees, but to the sound of hoovering. I checked my watch: 7am. Not quite believing my ears, I poked my head out of my tent. My neighbour was indeed hoovering the grass outside hers.

As the weekend unfolded I was struck by the lengths my fellow campers had gone to in order to recreate a slice of suburbia in this rural field. It was not enough to create a canvas replica of a three-bedroom semi; some of them, travelling in groups, had constructed entire neighbourhoods, complete with gar den fences, conservatories, porches and 'garages' made from blue awning.

I felt as though I'd stumbled into a bizarre cross between the Ideal Home Exhibition and a Camping and Caravanning Fetishists' Rally as neighbours swapped compliments across the garden fence about folding tables and demonstrated gleefully the hotplates on their Aga-sized camping stoves. It's tempting to say that this need to take our home comforts with us on holiday is a peculiarly British trait, a way of creating some corner of a foreign field that is forever Croydon, but I am relieved to report that it is an international phenomenon and our European cousins are way ahead of the game.

Taking the proverbial biscuit (McVitie's Digestive of course) are the Dutch. On a recent camping trip to Italy a colleague reported seeing Dutch families heaving pine dressers and chests of drawers into their tents, while the Italians rigged up satellite dishes before settling down to enjoy the Formula One racing. Spanish campers are apparently quite partial to a picket fence.

Seen in this context, Gail's puff pastry doesn't seem quite so flaky after all.